DEAR FRIEND

It is 6:05am, the atmosphere is silent like the places in my body, with the cemeteries of words my mother left unsaid, the first cock just crowed and I’m torn between accepting reality and holding fate with a fragile hands. I do not want to tell you about the plays, places, people and everything this coal city inscribed on my skin and the debris of memories deposited in my veins, for I may not be able to stop this cloud from clouding and this water from forming ripples in my eyes.

Like the way leaves fall and they’re passed down as fallen testaments and the way the birds sing and their voices leave footprints of our father’s old school music, like the way the sun shines on a sunny Sunday morning and set like a spectrum of rainbows in lover’s eyes, like the way the wind comes with the echoes of voices- too weighty to be conveyed by the tides and leave in a way that it never really go away, like the way blue sky is a home for girls from broken homes and the stars wears the faces of everyone who touched our souls and faded into a whisper and like the way our shadows are allergic to darkness and our hearts are castles of written and unwritten poems, so is the way a friend leaves at a train station and we stare intently like trying to sculpt time in a way that separates goodbyes from life’s mix.

My friend, I’ve seen you laugh and with the contours on your face I see you overshadow your emptiness, I’ve seen you smile and I could tell how many battles you won- unfought, I’ve seen you play and I could remember how you bring childhood days like heydays, back to my doorstep, I’ve seen you on the football field, how you run and dribble, and I see you running through life and dribbling your failures to reach the goal post of unmerited mercies like Messi, I’ve seen you go mad countless times when I call you those funny names and laugh at your mother tongue and I’ve seen you wave everything behind leaving no records of wrongs, I’ve seen you work and I see a door open on the other side, to a room with an AC on the wall and diverse portraits of your blue dreams on the shelf and I’ve walked with you and felt the freshness that comes with walking with people who may not know how to reach their destinations but convinced about reaching. You’re a god after God’s art and gods are sacred beings tomorrow worship. Just a step away from your shell and fears is a step closer to your dreamscape and aspirations, so when tomorrow comes, I’ll be somewhere in your heart waiting to watch you on the tv with the news of the first man and woman to beat the storms, reach the sky and dine with the stars.

This is me trying to immortalize our memories, I’m just a poet and my feelings are best hidden in words, this is me writing a letter to the sun to teach you the art of shinning and how not to die when life attempts to kill you, this is me writing your name somewhere in my life’s diary with a celestial pen, this is me telling you it’s normal to fall but abnormal to remain on the floor, this is me looking back as I walk away from everything we once had and shared, this is me praying for you- though my tongue maybe broken, this is me wishing you the best life has to offer. Farewell my friend.